Weighty

I stood at the doorway waiting to bring in the Jell-o for the game to see who could eat it the fastest through a straw.  My eyes watched the room from afar.  Looking at the wide range of emotions on the kids’ faces and seeing their reactions to counting stickers.  When I looked closer, I saw and felt hope.  These kids live at Hope House.  A House that can be filled with Hope.  An expectation of things to come, the potential for changed lives filled the room.

Suddenly, my attention turned to a cry from outside the room with commotion.  I turned to see what happened.  Katleho (above) sat on the floor crying.  I asked what had happened to find out that he had fallen forward with his head hitting the floor first.  A bump already popped out and a previous scar from another fall stood out.  My heart reached out with my hands as I tried to hold his hand.  The caretaker tried to drag him to his feet by grabbing his hand, but I went behind asking if I could carry him into the kitchen.  I picked him up, not noticing the wetness, and sat with him on the floor.  I asked the caretakers about Katleho’s seizures and if he was taking his medicine along with if he was up for adoption.

Desperately, I wanted to take him home with me along with all the other kids.  I wanted to hold them in my arms and give them the one-on-one attention they crave.  Yet, more than that, I wanted to show them that I believe in them.  I believe they can.  I don’t want to say, “I can do this for you.” I want to empower them and overwhelm them with love. To feel the weight of the glory of God and the weight of His love for them.

1 Corinthians 13:7 “Love bears up under anything and everything that comes, is ever ready to believe the best of every person, its hopes are fadeless under all circumstances, and it endures everything”

Pray!

Meet Gugu

Meet Nomfundo

I hold these two girls in my heart and in my arms.  They make my heart happy and I love getting to see them on Fridays at Hope House.  But, there’s a slight problem…they don’t like each other.  They’re in that lovely later elementary school girl age where they fight and seek attention.  Not to mention that Nomfundo recently came to Hope House a few weeks ago so she is still adjusting to the new environment.  My prayer is that the love of Christ would completely overwhelm them and transform their lives, which in turn dramatically changes their relationship.

Anything I can be praying for you about on this Friday night?

Multi-tasking…

…are you really good at it? Sometimes I feel like this word gets used in place of people just having “multiple things to do” rather than doing multiple things at once.

Multi-tasking: The ability of a person to perform more than one task at the same time

Multi-tasking  has benefits of course, yet last night I was experiencing some of the negatives…

Here’s how the situation went:

The television was on in the background–we weren’t really watching it.  My roommate was showing me a slideshow of boys, which turned out very good and was quite entertaining.  🙂  I was talking to 2 people on MSN Messenger…a boy and my other roommate who just got home from Guatemala (Carrie–see her blog on the side!).  To top it all off, I was eating Red Velvet cake too!

At the end, I wished I could have given each of them my full attention and focus to show how much I really cared and wanted to talk with them.  At least, I believe I’m pretty good at multi-tasking so I was able to continue to do all of the aforementioned tasks.  Yet, I want to be the type of person who is fully engaged and listens well to one at a time than listens okay to multiple.

There’s a few thoughts for you to ponder on such a FREEZING day 🙂 Stay Warm!